Published May 15, 2025

The Duo Who Built D.C.’s First Freeway: Archie Alexander, Maurice Repass, and the Whitehurst Story

In 1949, Washington opened its first elevated freeway—but the real story is the interracial engineering duo behind it. Discover how Archie Alexander and Maurice Repass built the Whitehurst Freeway and quietly broke barriers in Jim Crow-era America.

Washington’s Whitehurst Freeway is a concrete fixture above K Street in Georgetown. Thousands of D.C. drivers zoom across it daily, barely glancing at the steel supports whizzing by. But here’s the kicker: this 1940s engineering marvel was the brainchild of a Black and white engineering duo from Iowa. Yep, you read that right. Meet Archibald “Archie” Alexander and Maurice Repass — college buddies turned business partners whose friendship quite literally reshaped Washington, D.C.

Their company, Alexander & Repass, took on the job of building the city’s first elevated freeway. Their names? Nowhere on a plaque. But their story? Worth telling.

Archie Alexander, African American civil engineer and co-founder of Alexander & Repass, pictured during the late 1940s. — Archie Alexander, the pioneering Black engineer behind the Whitehurst Freeway, led major infrastructure projects across the U.S. as part of his interracial firm Alexander & Repass.

Georgetown Goes Elevated: D.C.’s First Freeway Arrives

Picture Georgetown in the 1940s: charming brick storefronts, cobblestone streets… and gridlock. M Street was a daily mess. Enter the idea of the Whitehurst Freeway, dreamed up by Highway Director Capt. Herbert C. Whitehurst way back in the 1930s. War delayed things, but by 1947, construction was rolling.

On October 8, 1949, some 3,500 Washingtonians gathered to see four-year-old Maria Whitehurst Brownette (yes, Capt. Whitehurst’s granddaughter) snip the ribbon. The city’s first freeway had arrived, one mile of modernity stretching from Key Bridge to Rock Creek Parkway. No stoplights. No bottlenecks. Just steel and speed.

Built with over 5,000 tons of steel, featuring swooping cloverleaf ramps and hovering 45 to 70 feet above the ground, the Whitehurst was called “the last word in modern traffic engineering.” Three-quarters of Georgetown’s daily 38,000-vehicle traffic was expected to reroute onto this skyway. It was, according to the Evening Star, “a driver’s dream.”

The freeway was named in honor of Capt. Whitehurst posthumously. Though he didn’t live to see its completion, it was his brainchild. His successor in the highway department proposed the name, and the D.C. Commissioners approved it.

Construction progress on the Whitehurst Freeway in Georgetown, Washington D.C., 1949, showing elevated steel structure over K Street. — Construction progress on the Whitehurst Freeway in 1949, with steel beams rising above K Street in Georgetown. The elevated highway would become D.C.’s first freeway and a landmark of postwar infrastructure. Source: Streets of Washington

But here’s the twist: while city officials got the glory, the real builders were left in the shadows. The firm behind the whole thing? Alexander & Repass. And the Evening Star didn’t miss the chance to note: “One member is a Negro, the other a white man.” In an era when segregation ruled the South and much of the North, the harmony between these two engineers was not just rare — it was quietly revolutionary.

Whitehurst Freeway under construction at 31st and K Streets NW, Washington D.C., April 15, 1948, designed by African American engineer Archie Alexander. — Whitehurst Freeway under construction at 31st and K Streets NW on April 15, 1948. Named for the late highways director Herbert C. Whitehurst (1930–1948), the elevated roadway was designed and built under the leadership of Archie Alexander, a pioneering African American civil engineer. Source: DDOTDC

From Football Field to Freeways: The Iowa Origins

Rewind to 1910. On the football field at the University of Iowa, two linemen — one Black, one white — played side by side. Archie Alexander, the son of a janitor, would become the university’s first Black engineering graduate in 1912. Maurice Repass was his teammate, his friend, and eventually, his business partner.

But Archie’s path wasn’t easy. Degrees didn’t mean jobs for Black engineers in 1912. So he took manual labor gigs before founding his own construction firm in Des Moines. By 1929, Repass joined forces with him. Thus was born Alexander & Repass — a partnership of mutual respect, not racial politics. Archie summed it up: “Can you get the job done? That’s what people want to know.”

Together, they tackled everything from bridges to sewage plants. By the 1930s, their resumes were stacked with government projects. And Washington? It became their second home.

Building the Capital, One Structure at a Time

Before the Whitehurst, Alexander & Repass had already made their mark. They built the B&O Railroad underpass at Riggs Road NE in the late 1930s and, during World War II, the Tidal Basin bridge and seawall near what would become the Jefferson Memorial.

That Tidal Basin project? It made headlines for one subtle but powerful reason: an integrated crew. In 1943, the Office of War Information highlighted Alexander & Repass for employing both Black and white workers. Not exactly standard in federal construction at the time.

By 1947, the Whitehurst contract was theirs. Years of experience, a reputation for reliability, and an approach that quietly broke color lines made them the obvious choice.

Portrait illustration of Archie Alexander, African American bridge builder and civil engineer, by artist Charles Alston, 1943. — Archie Alexander – Builder of Bridges,” illustration by Charles Alston (1943). Alexander was one of the nation’s first prominent Black civil engineers. Courtesy of the U.S. National Archives and Records Administration (NAID 535621), via Wikimedia Commons.

Working Through the Challenges — And the Rules

The Whitehurst project was no walk in the park. The elevated road had to skirt rail lines, dodge warehouses, and thread its way over canals. Foundations were sunk with surgical precision to avoid disrupting businesses below. Massive steel beams were set using a railroad crane car that crawled along the tracks.

Archie Alexander, always the hands-on leader, coordinated with local businesses to make sure their loading docks weren’t blocked. When union rules demanded segregated facilities on-site, Alexander responded not with protest but practicality: everyone got their own paper cups, and the bathrooms? Renamed “skilled” and “unskilled.”

Call it a small rebellion. Call it brilliant. Either way, it worked.

Back at their temporary homes in D.C. — Repass on Riggs Road, Alexander with a friend on S Street — the pair kept their team focused and morale high. Their secretary, Ilene Dahltorp, captured the vibe best: “All I know is, they are both swell people to work for.”

The Big Day: Whitehurst Freeway Opens

Dedication day arrived: October 8, 1949. Little Maria Whitehurst cut the ribbon. Fire department ladders formed an arch. D.C. dignitaries gave speeches. And drivers? They zipped onto the mile-long viaduct, thrilled to escape Georgetown’s choke points.

The Evening Star raved about “not a traffic light in sight”. The ramps were smooth, the views were great, and the steel was designed to handle everything from buses to blizzards. It was overbuilt, sure. But it’s still standing today.

Archie and Maurice? They were there, watching quietly from the sidelines. Contractors, not politicians. But their pride must’ve been sky-high. Later, Alexander would simply say, “It’s good to be identified with a useful project.” Repass quipped they were just glad it was “over and done with.”

What Could Have Been: Unrealized Expansion Plans

There were big dreams for the Whitehurst beyond Georgetown. Original city planning documents envisioned an expanded expressway under K Street NW, stretching all the way from Tenley Circle to 15th and H Streets NE. It would have connected with the proposed Arizona Freeway. But as often happens in D.C., plans ran into local resistance and funding issues. The grand extension was shelved.

At one point, there was also a serious push to widen M Street itself by buying up properties on both sides. The goal? Turn M Street into a full-blown thoroughfare. But the cost — and the potential destruction of Georgetown’s historic charm — led planners to abandon that idea too.

Legacy in Steel and Silence

The Whitehurst Freeway endures. So does the legacy of its builders. No plaque bears their names. But their story, once tucked in an old newspaper column, now resurfaces.

Archie Alexander would go on to be named Governor of the U.S. Virgin Islands in 1954. Repass stayed in the business, more reserved but no less respected. Their partnership predated the Civil Rights Movement, but it quietly anticipated it: two men, judged by skill not skin, building bridges — literally and figuratively.

Every time you glide over K Street on that highway in the sky, you’re tracing their legacy. A legacy built on friendship, forged in grit, and riveted together by mutual respect.